Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars Ch. 01

"So, what do you think?"

"Don't be too surprised if she says yes."

"Really?"

She was different the next time she came out, when she dropped off their dinners. Not so distant, her smile full of curiosity, her eyes ready for the next adventure.

"She's coming," he said. "Mark my words."

"You think so?"

"Yup."

The next time she came by Ted pointed out the blue-hulled boat across the way: "See that one? Altair on the stern?"

"The stern?"

"On her bum?" Ted added, helpfully.

"Oh. Yeah?"

"We're here tonight, leaving in the morning around eight. If you feel like coming along, you know where we'll be."

He watched the girl looking at his boat, wondering what was going through her mind, wondering what sort of calculus a girl made at a time like this. Unknown versus an unknown-known, an adventure versus a slow-motion train wreck.

If what he supposed was indeed going on.

But then the girl nodded her head and moved off again.

"Well?" Ted asked.

And he shrugged, but maybe he smiled just a little, though he thought he already knew the score. "Just have to wait and see," he added - knowingly.

"I knew it. She's coming..."

And again, he only smiled, yet he wondered why he thought he knew the answer. Jaded, perhaps? Getting a little too cynical about things? Or...simply judging other people through the prism of his life with Barbara...?

"Ya know," he sighed, "wouldn't surprise me either way."

"That's kind of a..."

"A cop-out? Yeah, I guess it is."

"What's wrong, Pops?"

"I think I need a change of pace, Paco. A real change of pace. I'm getting close to sixty years old, you know? I can retire next year...in fact, I think they want to push some of us old-timers into early retirement. We're getting expensive, and a lot of us still have pension obligations the company will owe us. All these new guys? Mainly 410Ks, matching contributions, that stuff..."

"How long could you fly, Dad?"

"Well, a few more years, like four, but I could matriculate over to the training academy, teach there, do check-rides..."

"What did you used to call those guys? The Silver Eagles?"

"Yup."

"Could you do that?"

"I could, but I'd have to move to the east coast."

"Yikes. You wouldn't...?"

"I used to think so. Now, I'm not so sure..."

"Dad! Leave Seattle? You've lived here, what...twenty-two years?"

"Yup. Year you were born. It would be hard, have to give up the boat, that whole thing."

Ted shook his head. "That's not you, and you know it."

"What do you think you're gonna do, Paco. I mean, really...getting laid is one thing, but..."

"Dad, I'm not sure I'm cut out to be a priest..."

"What? That's a big change...when did you start feeling this way?"

"Oh, I don't know. It's like the more science I take the more incongruent religion and science become. Two competing worldviews, I guess, but one feels more and more like a child's fairytale to me."

"You think medicine's the answer?"

Ted nodded his head.

"Why now? Just exposure to new ideas?"

"Maybe. But sometimes," his son added, pausing to take a deep breath, "it just feels like growing up."

"Ah. So, religion is childish?"

"I didn't say that."

"Oh? What did you say?"

"I'm not sure I want to spend my entire life cloaked in a mystery that, well, there's nothing about religion grounded in fact, is there?"

He shook his head. "You can't confuse fact and faith, son. You have faith, then that becomes bedrock; if you don't, well, it's easy to turn and walk away."

"But it's not always so easy, is it? I mean..."

"I know what you mean. That's why I'll never deny the existence of God, and why I can't go to church. I have my doubts about the whole thing, but I don't have the courage of my convictions so here I sit, still sitting on the fence, looking at life go by and wondering what all the commotion is about."

"What about Mom?"

"I think, in a way, the question drove her to drink."

"Seriously?"

He laughed a little, inside, at his son's sincere expression. "I don't know, Ted. Look at the Irish...they brought Christianity to the British Isles, and then they turned around and invented whiskey. Talk about cause and effect..."

"Is that true?"

"Hell, I don't know. One of the Fathers told us that in a history class...but then again, he was Irish..."

Ted shook his head. "Why do you think she drinks, Dad?"

"Because she hurts, son. She drinks to make it all go away because she doesn't have the courage of her own convictions."

"What? How so?"

"Because she has no faith, either in God or in herself. She always turned to anyone who'd offer to ease her pain..."

"You mean, like, buy her a drink?"

He nodded, but, in his mind's eye he remembered coming home early more than once and finding her and another man in the throes.

"What is it, Dad? What are you thinking?"

"About her."

"About her, what?"

He shook his head. "I don't want to go there, son."

Ted shook his head too. "I know. I came home from school more than once..."

"Ted, please. Just stop. I don't want...we neither one need to spend any more time there than we already have, do we?"

"No, sir. Question?"

"Fire away."

"What do you think? Would I be a better priest than a physician?"

"Wow, now there's a question." He looked out at the night, looked up at the stars. "Maybe they're not as far apart as you think?"

"Hmm? Why do you say that?"

"Well, they're both grounded in a kind of rigorous curiosity, and at the same time they're both concerned with helping people find answers about themselves, maybe even their truest natures."

The boy nodded his head slowly, but for the first time he saw something odd in his son's eyes. A man's eyes. Thoughtful, yet full of understanding.

"Anyway, I doubt you'll ever be able to turn away from the Church, not completely. Maybe you'll just turn out like a lot of the rest of us...you'll go once a week and leave those mysteries to someone else."

"But, me?"

He shrugged. "What I think really doesn't matter, does it? You know, in your heart, what the answer to that is, and you don't need all my baggage cluttering up the floor..."

"Maybe, but I'd like to know what you think."

"Well, of course, I'd like to see you find your way to happiness. I think medicine would...well, I think you've got the right temperament for medicine. You've always been a kind of scientist, even when you were in Sunday school. You've always asked the hard questions, the kind of questions your teachers couldn't answer, not effectively, anyway. Their easy answers always seemed to..."

"They pissed me off. They still do."

"Still?"

"The answers never change, Dad. Someone is senselessly killed and there's only one answer. It's all a part of God's mysterious plan, or we can never really know why..."

"Which presupposes there's a why out there."

"Exactly. Which means an order, a purpose to all this, which is comforting..."

"So, what do you tell an old man when you find out he has something like pancreatic cancer? That he's going to die? Do you tell him the facts, turn him loose to find comfort in senseless emptiness?"

"I'm not sure I believe in the whole heaven and hell thing anymore, Dad."

"Then you just answered your question, Ted. Case closed. Do you want dessert?"

They laughed at that and were still giggling when the girl came by and asked if they wanted something sweet to finish off their meal. She looked puzzled when they started laughing again...

+++++

He slept late that morning, didn't get up 'til three-thirty. He showered and put on his running shoes, then went topsides and filled the water tanks before he went for his run. There was a huge, forested park across the little inlet and he stretched first, then took off, as always sure running was the most stupid form of exercise ever invented. After fifteen minutes he was sure running was the greatest thing ever, and after forty minutes he was wrapped in the familiar warmth of his runner's high. He slowed as he returned to the little marina, then walked it out for a few minutes - looking at his watch only once as he took in a few more really deep breaths.

He saw her on the dock just then, sitting on a dock-box, a large duffel on the planks by her feet - and he smiled.

When he walked up she looked up, saw him and smiled.

"Sorry about the hour," she said.

"You brought everything, I see. Burned all your bridges, did you?"

She nodded - but she turned away, too. "Yup, looks that way."

"You sure about this?"

She looked him in the eye then. "Yes. You're a good man. I can tell that much just by looking."

"I see."

She laughed at that, and he did too. "It's your son I'm not so sure of...?"

"Ted? Oh, he's harmless. Confused as hell, but harmless."

"Confused?"

"No spoilers, young lady. Oh, by the way, my name is Jim. Yours?"

"Tracy. Tracy Singleton."

"Well, Tracy, I hate to ask, but do you have your passport handy?"

That seemed to take her back a little...

"We may be boarded by the Coast Guard...in fact, odds are we will be more than once. They'll check, and as it's my boat it's my responsibility."

"So, you're a pilot? I mean, really?" she said as she pulled out her passport and handed it to him, hardly taking her eyes off him as he looked over her passport.

He looked up at her then, sizing up her words as a record of her experience so far. "Yup. Really."

"Can I see your pilot's license, then?"

He laughed at that. "Sure. You wanna come up, or wait here?"

"I think I'll wait here."

He nodded then hopped aboard, went below for his wallet - and he found Ted stumbling out of the aft head, rubbing his eyes. "Oh. You're up," he groaned.

"So is Tracy."

"Who?"

"Tracy. The gal you're going to marry."

"Jeez!"

"Better put some clothes on, Paco," he added, on his way to get his wallet. He went back out a minute later, stepped down to the swim platform on the stern and handed his license over to the girl - who looked duly impressed.

"So, no-foolin', eh? You're not a pretender?"

"I take it you've seen your fair share?"

"That's all there seems to be lurking about these days...if you know what I mean?"

As if the word 'lurking' wasn't enough, there was the look in her eyes: distrustful, alert, lonely. Distant. The literal opposite of Barbara, in other words. Where Barbara had always been reaching out, this girl had turned inward at some point. Her good looks had probably invited too much-unwanted attention...

"I suppose it's always been that way, Tracy. You ready to come on up, or having second thoughts?"

She handed her duffel over, then looked at his outstretched hand before she took it.

He saw it took an effort on her part, then he watched her looking at all the stuff that made Altair work.

"Don't worry," he said. "You can just sit back and watch..."

"Could you teach me?"

"Teach you?"

"To sail."

"Sure...but Ted's a better teacher than I ever was..."

"I doubt that," the girl said, looking him in the eye.

"Well, let me show you around down below."

"Do I have my own room?"

"Yes. It's small, but..."

"Oh, that okay."

He led her down the companionway, showed her the galley and the head, then led her to the tiny cabin under the cockpit. "Well, here it is..."

"You weren't kidding," she sighed.

"It's kind of a storeroom that happens to have a bunk," Ted said, now standing behind his father. "If it bothers you, we could switch places."

"No. I'll be fine here," the girl said.

Yes, he thought, you will be.

(c) 2017 | adrian leverkühn | abw | just a little bit of story-tellin'...